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[profit]

re: profit: oh yay politics.

Yep, but don't for an instant forget politics plays a HUGE role in law creation. 

A child is raped and the death penalty is demanded.

Brutalize a truck driver with a brick, and everyone demands you are let go because you were part of a riot.

No matter how distasteful, politics plays a massive role in what is allowed and what is not... No matter what causes more damage to society as a whole.

Think of how bad the makers of the iphone app that allowed you to shake a baby to death were hit.  I don't think a single one of the usual gang of angry parents or their lawyers missed a piece of those people.

Oboma hunt? Yeah that was investigated by the secret service...

Hot coffee ring a bell?  You can kill and kill and kill and kill and kill in that game... a little bit of sex and OMG CALL THE LAWYERS!!!!!!!!!!

Left 4 Dead 2 had the audacity to include a couple black zombies in the hoard to make it look more natural....   Yeah you guess what happened... Resident evil 5??? -> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123672060500987853.html  Then this is allowed to be given to children-> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5AEEee8kCG4

Do not forget politics IS what drives laws... =(

[Neonivek]

Hah, that's a serious question?

Unfortunately yes.

Though indeed I don't want rape in my Dwarf Fortress... but someone presented a question of why there shouldn't be controvercial aspects of Dwarf Fortress so I had to answer by simply saying: "Because it is controvercial" except I had to define controvercial because it was forgotten.

The two sentiments are pretty incompatible

No they are not. All I am saying is that the game should seek to fun for as many people as possible but that sacrifices need to be made. which was a lead in to say that these "Controvercial" aspects (which have here been defined as Rape for SOME reason despite the fact that the game is just full of non-sexual non-violent non-religious based controvercy all the time)

Heck it would be on topic to speak about Magic in this topic as well since magic is a controvercial topic. You could make this topic about the pernament removal of Nobles because that is a controvercial topic. You can include Multithreading because that is also controvercial.

[SSBR]

The two sentiments are pretty incompatible

No they are not. All I am saying is that the game should seek to fun for as many people as possible but that sacrifices need to be made. which was a lead in to say that these "Controvercial" aspects (which have here been defined as Rape for SOME reason despite the fact that the game is just full of non-sexual non-violent non-religious based controvercy all the time)

The incompatibility I saw was with stating that some people disliking it is the largest issue, while at the same time claiming that whether some people like it or not isn't the largest issue facing suggestions. In the end, DF probably should appeal to as many donator-type users as possible, or something. Hell, maybe I'm all wrong for thinking it should be expanded to more newbies.

Heck it would be on topic to speak about Magic in this topic as well since magic is a controvercial topic. You could make this topic about the pernament removal of Nobles because that is a controvercial topic. You can include Multithreading because that is also controvercial.

Multithreading is on a category of its own. The issues there aren't with whether people would actively dislike it, but with technical feasibility and cost. This thread was created as a response to a more vehement crowd of controversies, I think.

Also, I hate to say it, and it's not particularly bugging me, but you should probably know that you're spelling "controversial" wrong.

[Duke 2.0]

 If Toady wants sex in the game he will add it. If it is at the basic level of "Press this button with a person who has a relationship to this extent with you and depending on their personality they will either accept forming a family or decline" then a rape button is not needed. I can see it in legends mode because this is made to be a fantasy story simulator and I know quite a few major fantasy novels with rape as part of characters background.
 Summary: If the system is simple enough, no rape button. Legends could allow it, but this would depend on if Toady wants his fantasy stories to sometimes have heroes born from rape.

 Alright, onto incest. In most all cultures in the pre-industrial age there was incest. Villages were spread out and the methods of transportation between them was so horrible that you were often stuck in the same village your whole life. After a few generations everybody is related. You cannot have a relationship in the village without them being a first or second cousin. In such situations they need to do it to survive. Only once transportation allowed people to travel from village to village and populations became big enough that third cousins and on could happen that incest became taboo. And for good reason, it was only done to survive. There are many problems associated with it that if you don't need it to survive as a species you don't do it.
 Summary: If there is a small village in the middle of nowhere, incest will happen. As populations become larger and the option to not have it becomes viable then it will become taboo and won't happen as much, barring social, political and personal values.

 Ultimately it is up to Toady what he wants his Fantasy Story Generator to output. I'm thinking if these elements do eventually get in the game it will be like beating children. He didn't design a system to main children with their parents limbs. He made parents with limbs, children from them, and a combat system. Players and the program just made those results on it's own without any intent from the creator for it to be used like that. Rape would likely just be a byproduct of the reproductive system depending on how complex he makes it, and incest will be a byproduct of cultures and the desire to survive in these simulations.
 
 TL;DR: Toady won't program in rape and incest. If the game is as he wants it, such elements would come about on their own because of how open the system is. There is no need to expressively program for them. Controversial elements are simply the byproduct of players putting two and two together and using the system to form such elements on their own.

[profit]

Here is an excellent article commenting on the psychology of some of the things we are discussing.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/columns/the-needles/6127-You-Cant-Be-the-Hero-If-Youre-the-Rapist

Basically it states if the action can be justified somehow it is much more palatable that if it is not justified.  IE an escape from a concentration camp is much less appalling than creating a concentration camp.

Here is another interesting bit saying the games are banned ->
http://kotaku.com/5275409/rape-games-officially-banned-in-japan

And how things kind of spill over

-> http://www.destructoid.com/rape-game-controversy-bewilders-developers-131416.phtml

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Earlier this month, New York-based women's group Equality Now has started a letter-writing campaign to developer Illusion Software, demanding that they cease sale of the game, even though the game is produced for Japan and has never been officially on sale in America. Illusion Software has issued a quasi-statement, rightly saying it is "bewildered" by the campaign, because the game isn't intended for American audiences.

"We are simply bewildered by the [Equality Now protest]," stated Illusion. "We make the games for the domestic market and abide by laws here. We cannot possibly comment on [the campaign] because we don't sell them overseas."

And the toung in cheek disclaimer from one of the games...

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

All the characters appearing in this game have gone through special training and all actions carried out are done on the basis of mutual agreement.

Even if you’re a inhuman person who believes that fictional characters in creative works do not have human rights, please do not ignore this.

We also thank all the kind people who see a character in the story saying phrases such as “help me” and take it as a real call for help.

However, even though you are worrying for the characters in the story, these are all lines spoken from a script.

They are not saying all this from the bottom of their hearts. We are sorry that they have put in so much effort into their acting that some people will confuse it as something that is really happening.

This game is a fictional story.

and inside the game:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

    Surprised Suigen Ninja:
    I’ve recently learnt something that surprised me

    Listening Suigen Ninja:
    What is it?

    Surprised Suigen Ninja:
    We, fictional characters, apparently have human rights.

    Listening Suigen Ninja:
    Huh?

    Surprised Suigen Ninja:
    There are apparently some special people that will get angry and show sympathy for us if we get raped. And they’ll start lobbying for us too.

    Listening Suigen Ninja:
    Wow, we even can’t do anything ourselves without a creator or a player but we have human rights

    Surprised Suigen Ninja:
    Surprising isn’t it?

    Listening Suigen Ninja:
    Yeah. But since they acknowledge that we have human rights, I wonder if they’ll acknowledge that we have the right to vote too. Our creators will work hard to do some political manipulation.

    Surprised Suigen Ninja:
    We can’t be greedy. But well, since we have human rights we might as well suggest it.

    Listening Suigen Ninja:
    You’re right

    Surprised Suigen Ninja:
    We’re doing as we please. Please stop taking unneccessary actions.

Discussions about sex *excluding rape* in video games ->

http://arstechnica.com/gaming/news/2009/11/lets-talk-about-sex-in-video-games.ars

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Even in the United States, the rating system reflects the idea that games are for kids. According to its official requirements, the ESRB is open about its preference that applicants have experience dealing with children: "ESRB raters must be adults and typically have experience with children, whether through prior work experience, education or by being parents or caregivers themselves."

"This is the key to medium, in that we're viewing everything through the eyes of a child," Brathwaite pointed out. "It's not that kids don't matter or should be excluded, but our rating system is, by default, a bit reactionary."

For many gamers, the main problem with this concern about sex in games is that it doesn't exist in other forms of media. With books, movies, television, and comics, sex isn't a huge issue these days, but it's still a major concern when it comes to video games. In short, this is a massive double standard, since games containing sex are often slapped with an AO rating and movies with far racier content are allowed on retail shelves. Ars community member Nagumo claims to have "seen Baise Moi in Wal-Mart," a film that "features scenes involving rape that show real penetration and ejaculation! Never mind the sodomy with a .45."

And then there are games meant to educate that are sensationalised by the news and torn apart -> http://gamepolitics.livejournal.com/289083.html#cutid1

Here is it's trailer -> http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-846592551728203166&ei=Yqk2S9XVHIXSqgLujeTrCw&q=Super+Columbine+Massacre+RPG!&hl=en#

(I would so play this game if I didn't know how it ended.)

I am not actually going anywhere with THIS set of links.. just bringing in points of view.

[Dakk]

Jeez, so much for wanting to end the rape thing and talk about other controversial stuff.

[Silverionmox]

There's no need to dwell on stuff like that for an extraordinarily long time. There's no need for a Bestiality arc, or a detailed mechanic to determine whether a raped dwarf became physically aroused, whether she orgasmed and how guilty she felt about it afterwards. It suffices to have the intended rapist and the victim hold a little wrestling match and have them lie prone in the same square for a short while, during which the attacker will not be paying attention and can be sneaked upon. The effects would be a happy thought for the attacker, a potentially lasting unhappy thought for the victim and a small chance for pregnancy. And a casus belli if royalty (or even just a difference in nationality in some circumstances) is involved, of course. These things are just a crime between persons, and we also want crimes in the game that don't have to do with property, right?

Scaring off new players isn't really an argument, since the forums are full of enthusiastic descriptions of new ways to kill peaceful traders and kittens anyway. Any attention is good attention, GTA for example certainly isn't worse off for all the fuzz.

That being said, I'm going to mod in genitals sooner or later, just for the sake of verisimilitude. Even if the poor suckers don't know what to do with it. A game that models fingers can't omit body parts of the same size. Gives the occasion for tribes to wear kotekas (aka phallocarps, I kid you not), a common vestiment (and often the only one) in many parts of the world.

[KaelGotDwarves]

That being said, I'm going to mod in genitals sooner or later... A game that models fingers can't omit body parts of the same size.

Sorry, I just laughed really, really hard- everyone on the train thinks I'm insane. We all know it's not all about the size, bro.

Also, bit late to the party, I've seen mods (cough gobbo cough) that involve making gold plated dildos, gouging nipples, slicing off testicles, bruising breasts, and all sorts of yeaaaaaaaaaa...

Anyhow, I agree about the "we'll worry about it when the time's right".

Slavery, rape, incest, etc is all alluded to in the game already or mentioned in powergoals. Toady has shown no aversion to having controversial themes in a game before as long as it is clear it is a game and done well. It's not super important considering the other gameplay mechanics toady has lined up, so no need to be passing kidneystones arguing over it

I'm sure down the line you can mod in if it's not in vanilla DF: rape, bestiality, furries, whatever sick twisted thing your mind concocts - and right now there's dozens of better games if you want a focus on those aspects.

[Mechanoid]

Personally I'd like to see certain controversial elements simply because lots of my favourite stories and legends contain these elements.

This is all the arguement there is that makes sense, and all the arguement there needs to be. The fantasy story generator that will result from toady's work will be able to do a great number of things, but that number of things will be reduced if toady does not allow for as many events as possible to occur. In effect, it could end up being 1000 monkies typing on 1000 type-writers and producing any imaginable story, ever. [Potentially replicating any ancient societies' myths, from egypt to china to native american tribes.]

Imagine a story about someone, in every meaningful detail. Everything he sees and hears and acts. Eventually, 1 excessively simple paragraph of "Someone was born. Someone grew, and grew old. Someone died." will turn into several pages of detail interesting enough for you to actually finish reading the entire thing, from a forgettable single paragraph to a memorable story. Most if not all of the possible questions should be answerable from within the story, and eventually generated by the game, which that is why as many elements should be added to the fantasy story generator as possible.

Lets say there was a group of people who went to have an audience with the local leader in the nearby town. Along their way the find someone getting mugged. The group assists the victim and stops the mugger. They continue on with their journey with the mugger, where he is later imprisoned and the audience goes well because of their good deed.
If features are cut and left out because of such a hugely subjective word, the story of this group from the town would change just as much as if the features had not been cut -- but not for the better. In fact, if mugging is considered "too controversial" and is cut, that effectively destroys the entire mugger sub-plot. This makes for a boring "Point A to Point B" story that no one will care about.

"Controversy" is what ever the hell anyone wants it to be and will exist where ever some persons want to see it existing. It is an appeal to emotion (or rather, an appeal to being able to avoid having an emotion) that will ultimately stunt and damage the story-telling qualities of the game.

tl;dr
Imagine fortress mode where no dwarf goes berserk, or suicidally-depressed /insane because it would be "too controversial" to have the mentally unstable kill themselves or others.
Yawn.

[Cyx]

.

[SSBR]

But even then, let's say Fox claims Dwarf Fortress allows you to simulate rape in an intense level of details and that hundreds of pedophiles play it. Well, people who know what Dwarf Fortress is laugh. Pedophiles check it out, find out it was a lie, and don't come again. A number of people wanting to see what it is about just stay because the game is awesome. A handful of guillible people are deeply offended and no one cares.

Sure. That's an intense enough of a lie to get backlash. I wonder if they didn't lie? "DF, a strategy game produced by a man who goes by the name of 'Toady', allows you to brutally rape and murder children and animals, before carving their bones into ornaments and decorating your room."
It sure *sounds* bad, and worse, it'd be true! We'd be reduced to the defense of "That's taking it out of context", which is a lot weaker sounding than "You, sir, are a liar."
And there's stuff in-between, with more or less fabrication. Well orchestrated, it's possible a fair amount of repulsion could be produced towards DF, even if it wasn't strong enough to produce actual protests. So DF would get this aura of nastiness ("oh, it's that game that lets you do *anything*, blegh") and because of this (a lot?) fewer people try it out. And this is sad.

plus nothing would be illegal about it.

Oh pshaw. In civilized countries, yes, but I live in Canada. Our child porn laws are so overbroad that it is ridiculously close to being illegal-- one could construe the sentence, "DF is cool, I wish you could do every one of those things in real life" as child pornography if rape of a minor was possible in DF, though you would surely get laughed out of court. But, it's dangerously close. Given the Canadian disregard for the exact letter of the law, it could be prosecuted, too.

I mean, a kid can read books or watch movies, no one gets charged when this happens.

The difference is that these are video games. Surely video games shouldn't touch adult concepts? They're for kids! Ha ha ha-- except that's seriously how it works. :/

Has something like this happened already, with so unknown an indie game, or so harmless a simulation ? (both on the ground for a few frames)

Nothing has actually done this before to my knowledge. Pretty much every game with rape as a gameplay element has done it for the purposes of creating pornographic video games. If you want some small, unknown title that got a ton of backlash for including rape, I guess Rapelay is as close as you can get. Wasn't even released in the US, but that didn't stop Americans from protesting and demanding the halting of distribution. For what its worth, it worked-- the developers removed all references to the game and ceased distribution, though it lives on in the internet.
On the other hand, you have, say, Mass Effect, which had a sort of implied sex scene and was called a "rape simulator" and so on. And then right in between you have the Hot Coffee minigame in GTA:SA, which of course didn't hurt GTA's sales in general in the long term, but at the time it caused quite a bit of damage. It was rerated AO, they had to recall or rerate existing copies, deal with a class action lawsuit, create a new disc, republish, and all this with politicians raising threats about further control of the gaming industry, further litigation, and an overall suppression of artistic freedom in the industry (if, at least, you want to also be able to sell at all).

To balance it out, ME and GTA:SA were AAA games with a large fanbase, DF is not. And Rapelay was extremely unknown, but brutal and graphic in its depiction not only of sex, but of rape. I obviously can't predict exactly what will happen if DF got this, so I am rightfully shamed for making predictions. I wouldn't like to see it go deep in the bad end, though.

tl;dr
Imagine fortress mode where no dwarf goes berserk, or suicidally-depressed /insane because it would be "too controversial" to have the mentally unstable kill themselves or others.
Yawn.

I don't remember anybody advocating removing any content that anybody dislikes, but regardless, I agree.

Scaring off new players isn't really an argument, since the forums are full of enthusiastic descriptions of new ways to kill peaceful traders and kittens anyway. Any attention is good attention, GTA for example certainly isn't worse off for all the fuzz.

re: GTA, see above. It could have been better off, certainly. Rockstar deeply regrets adding the sex minigame to their codebase. Actually, just in general see above, I don't want to be redundant, and I'm sorry I replied to that other dude first, despite you beating him to the punch.

[sproingie]

Whatever the tentacle demons do happens "off camera" so to speak, and it's vague enough that well, you have to already know what tentacle demons do in other media to get the joke.

All this other manufactured righteous posturing is starting to put me in a Fell Mood

[Vester]

TL;DR: Toady won't program in rape and incest. If the game is as he wants it, such elements would come about on their own because of how open the system is. There is no need to expressively program for them. Controversial elements are simply the byproduct of players putting two and two together and using the system to form such elements on their own.

I remember he mentioned he avoided sexual characteristics and dimorphism for explicitly that purpose, since he knew people would try for that themselves.

Although the new beard/beardless tag opens up possibilities, which I'm certain people have already seen. I mean, I haven't scrutinized the raws, but I'm betting that for modders it means females and males can now have parts that the opposite gender lacks. Toady won't add things like that himself, but community members probably will.

[Foehamster]

I'm relatively happy with Toady's choices.  Having to go in the woods after dispatching a bear in adventure mode doesn't appeal to me or enhance my game experience.  Urist McMason cancels construct stone coffer for business-time might amuse me now and again, but I honestly don't care.

Couples taking synced breaks to socialize with each other (privately or with the rest of the fortress) would be nice.  Heck a dating system for single dwarves might be entertaining, it opens the realm of infidelity and the betrayal, jealousy and violence that comes if a dating or married dwarf starts looking around too much.  The adventure mode parallel of wooing an heir apparent to their suitor's wrathful dismay sounds exciting.

Besides there are more PG rated ways of presenting these things.  Maybe in adventure mode your spouse says, "I would like a(nother) child" and you can accept/decline and whoever's the female has a chance of becoming pregnant every so often until it happens.

Expansion of the Intimidation and other social skills allows for the bad guy to force a level of relationship, depending upon the other's will they might try to escape (a divorce mechanism other than just killing would be nice).

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

In 145 Urist McPrince was kidnapped by Grag de Goblin, Wrestler.
In 145 Urist McPrince became a captive of the Towers of Wailing
In 145 Urist McPrince became an unwilling friend of Grog de Goblin, Queen.
In 145 Urist McPrince became an unwilling lover of Grog de Goblin, Queen.
In 146 Urist McPrince was rescued by Urist McAdventurer from Evil Goblin Queen
In 146 Urist McPrince joined the Meatshield of Adventure
In 146 Urist McPrince became friends with Urist McAdventurer
In 146 Urist McPrince was struck down by Gobbles de Goblin, Guard

  The manner might be violent, furtive or as many procedurally awesome ways as possible.  For extra badness add a Polygamy ethics tag, don't complain if your civ ends up with the ACCEPTABLE value for the coming ethics diversification.

I haven't noticed any mention of the controversial drug topic (AFAIK beer doesn't even get one drunk) but I don't see any advantage in storytelling or gameplay to adding it in.  Think about a stoner movie if you don't believe me.

[Vester]

Considering that the man added individual ribs and teeth, he could add drunkeness.

Knowing you have 32 teeth doesn't really help storytelling or gameplay either.